


Nishiura vs Seido

by Sanae



Category: Ookiku Furikabutte | Big Windup!, ダイヤのA | Daiya no A | Ace of Diamond
Genre: Gen, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Team Bonding, probably, what do you expect, with Abe and Miyuki in the same story?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-08
Updated: 2015-07-16
Packaged: 2018-04-08 08:14:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 10,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4297302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sanae/pseuds/Sanae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just before the start of the Saitama and West Tokyo Summer Prelims, the Nishiura boys treat themselves to a trip to Tokyo where they’ll spend a full day training with Seido Baseball Team. What could possibly go wrong…</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I apologise in advance. This is an entirely self-indulging story I concocted simply because I’ve always wanted to have Abe meet with Miyuki. Just for situational purposes, this story takes place right after the lottery that paired Nishiura with Tosei, when in Seido the now-retired 3rd years were still the core of the 1st string. For this reason, I don’t think it’ll spoil much, (unless you haven’t read one of the two manga, in which case you might not really understand half of it). Last but not least, I’ll try to keep it as light-hearted as possible so hopefully it’ll be fun to read so, without further ado…

**The Prologue**

It all started with rather innocuous text received by Takashima Rei, the super competent Assistant Coach/Talent Scout from the renown Seido High School Baseball Team. Since she was very busy marking the latest batch of English tests from her third year students, she was only going to spare a quick glance at the top of the range smartphone the school provided her with. Instead, Rei did a double take when she saw the sender’s  name displayed on the screen: Momoe Maria.

Suddenly forgetting all about the tests, she extended her hand towards the phone, noticing how it was shamefully trembling a little. In spite of that, she still  managed to unlock the screen and, tapping on the text notification, she read the message. It was a very short one:

_Rei-san, please call me whenever you read this._

Feeling a shiver down her spine, she let her finger hover over the phone while she internally debated what to do. She could try to ignore the message and carry on with her packed schedule, hoping that by pretending she had not seen the message it would just disappear. She even contemplated actually deleting the darn thing for a second or two before she finally came back to her senses:

‘No,’ she told herself resolutely, ‘ignoring her won’t do you any good and you know it.’

She quickly tapped on the touchscreen, bringing up Maria’s contact details and before she could persuade herself to do otherwise, she pressed the green button which would place the call.

‘Wow, that was quick!’ was the answer she got.

‘Hello to you too, Momoe-san,’ Rei replied with only a hint of sarcasm.

‘Sorry,’ Maria replied, ‘I wasn’t expecting you to call me so soon, after all, you’re a busy person.’

‘From what I hear, you’ve been rather busy yourself,’ Rei  countered, feeling rather proud of her calm tone of voice, ‘also, I know better than to ignore you for too long,’ she added for good measure.

‘I’m not that scary, am I?’ Maria asked her.

Rei didn’t grace that with an answer, instead, she said:

‘What can I do for you?’

‘I have a favour to ask of you,’ Maria said confirming Rei's worst fears.

‘Okay,’ she forced herself to say, ‘I’m listening…’

Ten minutes later, she regretted doing that because, just as she remembered, listening to Maria was never a good idea. The younger woman could probably talk an Eskimo village into buying a year-long supply of ice and that explained the reason why Rei had somehow agreed to arrange a practice session between Seido’s current first string and the brand new baseball team Maria had cobbled together from a bunch of first years, all hailing from a school the name of which still made Rei break into the sort of cold sweat she associated with an utter and crushing defeat: Nishiura High School.

_To be continued…_

 


	2. Nishiura Arrives

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks in advance for reading this and for any kudos/bookmarks/comments you might choose to leave!

**Nishiura Arrives**

In spite of still being quarter to five in the morning, fifteen minutes before the agreed meeting time, Maria was happy to see that all ten of the Nishiura Baseball Team members were already gathered at the school’s entrance. Some of them, like firstbase Oki Kazutoshi, or left Mizutani Fumiki looked still half groggy with leftover sleep; in contrast, thirdbase and cleanup Tajima Yuuichiro was being his normal hyperactive self, to the supreme annoyance of captain Hanai Azusa who was doing his best to keep Nishiura’s resident batting genius under control, with the help of center Izumi Kousuke. Meanwhile, the team’s main catcher Abe Takaya also had his share of trouble trying to calm down their ace pitcher, Mihashi Ren, who looked to be even more nervous than usual.

‘Good morning,’ Maria said to her team.

‘Good morning, Momokan!’ Tajima shouted, his loud voice covering everyone else’s greeting.

‘Okay,’ the coach said, ‘while we wait for Shiga-sensei to arrive with the bus, there are a few things I need to make sure you all understand,’ she paused for long enough to see if she had everyone’s attention,  ‘the school we’re going to visit today is one of the top of the nation’s powerhouse, this means they have state-of-the-art training facilities and iron-fist discipline. This means you all need to be on your very BEST behaviour today,’ she glared at Tajima who immediately quieted down and proceeded to nod a few times, ‘you will stay together at all times and will not wander around the place, no matter how awestruck you are,’ she added looking at Mihashi whose eyes already were as big as saucers, probably due to whatever mental picture his mind had conjured, ‘and last but not least,’ Maria said staring straight on to Abe, ‘you will be nice and will offer them your best smile.’

‘I’ll try,’ the catcher promised, already forcing himself to smile, failing miserably.

‘I guess that’ll do,’ Maria accepted with resignation, ‘now, do you all have everything you need?’

‘YES!’ they all shouted at the same time.

‘Okay,’ Maria replied and, hearing the sound of an engine, she saw the school bus coming from around the corner. The vehicle stopped right in front of them and, after the driver opened the door, the math teacher and team's advisor Shiga Tsuyoshi climbed down the short flight of steps, holding his finger to his lips.

‘Shh,’ he shushed, ‘we need to be quiet,’ he added half-whispering.

‘Why?’ Maria asked him matching his tone of voice.

In lieu of replying, he pointed at the first row of seats on the left side of the bus; there Maria saw the team’s manager, first year Shin’oka Chiyo, leaning against the window soundly asleep, with what looked like Shiga-sensei’s jacket covering her small frame.

‘She’s spent the entire night analysing two videos of the latest practice matches Seido’s held on their grounds,’ Shiga-sensei explained and, producing two notebooks, he offered one to Maria, ‘here’s your copy,’ he said then, looking at Abe, he gave him the other one and said, ‘and here’s yours.’

‘Thank you,’ Abe said already scanning the first page.

‘She’s amazing,’ Maria said glancing at the sleeping girl with a lot of affection.

‘Yes, she is,’ Shiga-sensei agreed, ‘which is why we must let her rest, okay?’ he added looking at the other members of the team, ‘we’ll all travel to Tokyo, _very quietly_ , is that understood?’

‘Yes, sensei,’ the team replied, their voices sounding unusually soft.

With this, and true to their word, the entire team boarded the bus and even Tajima managed to stay still for nearly the entire length of the trip, which made Hanai thank every deity in the universe since that allowed him to concentrate on the notebook Abe held in his hands.

‘Momokan wasn’t kidding,’ the captain murmured, ‘their stats are scary.’

‘Yeah, they are,’ Abe replied sounding very excited by the prospect.

‘You’re thinking we can beat them, aren’t you?’ Hanai asked him even though he feared the answer.

‘Of course,’ the catcher replied confidently.

Hanai stared at the younger boy in awe, wondering whether there would be a time in which he too would feel so sure about his own skills. He then spared a glance at Tajima and, shaking his head once, he returned his attention to the detailed data their manager had painstakingly written down.

***

Roughly an hour later, Takashima Rei was following Kataoka Tesshin, the almighty coach of the Seido Baseball Team, as they made their way to the school’s main entrance, where she expected to find the members of the first string who had been ordered to gather there. As they walked, Rei started going through the schedule she had planned for the day.

‘Upon their arrival,’ she told Kataoka, ‘we’ll do a light warm up together; then we’ll offer them some breakfast and, after that, if that’s okay with them, we’ll hold a joint training session. We’ll hold the practice game shortly after lunch.’

‘Sounds good,’ Kataoka said sounding a little less stern than usual.

‘Since we’ll have the first official game of the season in two days, I think it’ll be a good idea to tell the players to take it easy, let’s not forget this is just a practice match and…’

‘Takashima,’ Kataoka interrupted her, ‘am I imagining things or you’re a bit tense today?’

‘What?’ she shrieked a little, ‘no, why would I be tense? That’s…that’s ridiculous, I…’

‘You are tense,’ the main coach sentenced, ‘and you’ve been jittery ever since you asked me to allow this practice game with Nishiura.’

‘Speaking of which,’ Rei said hoping to switch the focus of their conversation, ‘why did you agree so easily? I was convinced you’d say no.’

‘Your instincts serve you right,’ he confirmed, ‘I was going to decline. But then you said something which made me curious about this team.’

‘Which was?’ she asked cautiously.

‘You excused yourself telling me that you hadn’t been able to say no to this Momoe-san,’ Kataoka supplied, ‘I honestly didn’t think there would be anyone who could be more persuasive than you are.’

At this Rei lost her ability to speak.

‘It’s made me curious to know more about her,’ Kataoka continued, offering her the slightest hint of a smile.

‘It’s a long story,’ she tried to deflect.

‘I have time,’ Kataoka insisted.

Rei stopped walking and, for the umpteenth time, she regretted placing that phone call.

‘Alright,’ she finally surrendered, ‘you do remember that throughout my middle and high school days I used to be the manager of a softball team which won every possible championship but one?’

‘Yes,’ Kataoka replied, ‘but you weren’t just the manager, were you?’

‘No, I wasn’t just the manager,’ Rei confirmed, ‘it was during those years that I honed my scouting skills, I was very proud of being able to draw the potential of our players and my contribution to the team was indeed instrumental towards the championships we did win.’

Kataoka didn’t say anything to that, letting her continue her story instead.

‘I was in my third year of high school,’ Rei said, ‘we were just one game away from achieving a perfect record in both middle and high school, no other school has ever achieved such a thing. I was so sure we’d win that I even asked the school to make victory t-shirts with a big V6 printed on them.’

‘That’s…’

‘I know,’ Rei interrupted him, ‘it was awfully arrogant of me to think that this no-name school would be able to beat us. I can only justify this by saying I was young and very naïve. ‘

‘Was it a close call?’ Kataoka asked her.

‘I wish,’ Rei replied, ‘it ended up being a shutout game for them. We were beaten 11-0.’

‘Oh,’ was all Kataoka could muster.

‘The mastermind behind that defeat was none other than a bratty first year manager,’ Rei said now sounding upset, ‘to think I was laughing at the long plaits she wore for that match. _Pocahontas_ , that’s what I called her,’ she explained, ‘I underestimated her so badly that I’m still angry at myself.’

‘I can tell that,’ Kataoka said, ‘how is it that you two stayed in touch?’

‘I told you, didn’t I?’ Rei replied, ‘you cannot say no to her. After the game she had the cheek to tell me that she admired me and that it had been her dream to play a game against my team!’

At that Kataoka could not help but to produce a full smile.

‘I have no idea how it happened but I ended up giving her my phone number,’ Rei explained, ‘and for some reason we did end up becoming something like friends. As scary as she is, she's a surprisingly nice person.’

The coach studied his assistant for a moment then, he got back to his serious self and said:

‘We’d do well not to underestimate them then.’

‘That’s for sure,’ Rei said, ‘she was dangerous as a manager; as a coach, she’ll be lethal.’

Kataoka nodded his agreement and, with that, they both resumed walking, reaching the members of Seido’s current first string who were all already waiting for them neatly lined up in two rows. A quick glance was enough for them to notice that there were two poignant absences in their midst.

‘Where are Sawamura and Kominato?’ he asked third year catcher Takigawa Chris Yuu.

‘I’m sorry about that,’ the team manager replied looking apologetic, ‘it seems Sawamura forgot about today and went off running. Kominato has now gone to retrieve him.’

‘That idiot,’ Rei hissed, ‘of all days…’

‘They’ll both be here soon,’ Chris tried to comfort her.

Just as he finished uttering the sentence, they saw a sweat drenched Sawamura speeding towards them, with poor Kominato doing his best to keep up. Fortunately for the first year pitcher, there wasn’t time to tell him off because, right at that instant, they saw the Nishiura bus halting in front of the gate.

‘They’re here,’ Rei said and, once again, she started getting nervous.

‘It’ll be fine,’ Kataoka reassured her, ‘trust me.’

Rei could only bring herself to nod.

_To be continued…_


	3. Meeting Nishiura

**Meeting Nishiura**

The first thing they noticed as the Nishiura bus stopped was that the small-ish vehicle had definitely seen better days, and the lack of any baseball related lettering on either its front or its side made it obvious that the school bus was a multipurpose one, as opposed to the brand new model Seido High had purchased for the exclusive use of their baseball team.

Rei waited until the door slid open with a metallic screech and, it wasn’t until Nishiura's coach stepped out of the bus, that she moved from the spot she had remained frozen. She barely noticed Kataoka following her as she had all her attention focused on the twenty three year old woman who was wearing the official cream coloured Nishiura uniform; the name of the team was scribbled in red cursive over her ample bosom which, Rei noted with a pang of envy, had actually got bigger since they had last seen each other. Of course, she also sported a pair of tight woven plaits.

‘Rei-san!’ Maria exclaimed seeing her friend.

‘Momoe-san,’ she replied feeling proud of her poised tone of voice, ‘welcome to Seido High School.’

‘Thank you,’ the younger woman said offering her one of her best looking smiles.

Behind her, Rei noticed a spectacled man in his mid to late thirties, probably a teacher, and a very cute young girl, likely the manager, along with a couple of very serious looking boys; one very tall but thin with a buzz cut, who looked like he was doing his best not to feel overwhelmed, the other a lot shorter, dark haired and with a pair of observing eyes already studying everything they saw.

Rei was about to introduce Kataoka to Maria when, from inside the bus, they all heard some sort of commotion. Maria turned her attention towards the vehicle’s door and looked like she was about to ask what was going on when another boy, this one with dark brown hair and a lot of freckles (or where they spots? Rei wasn’t sure), poked his head out and, speaking matter-of-factly, he said:

‘Mihashi doesn’t want to come out: he’s too scared of those guys.’

 _Those guys_ , it seemed, were the Seido players.

‘Oh no, not again,’ Rei heard Maria say to herself. The young coach turned to Rei and Kataoka and said, ‘sorry about that, Mihashi is our pitcher and he was badly bullied in middle school.’

‘Poor thing,’ Rei said sympathetically, ‘is there any…’

She never finished the sentence for, right then, the dark haired boy who had just placed his bag on the ground, literally pushed the freckled boy out of the way and, without further ado, he shouted:

‘MIHASHI, I’M COUNTING TO THREE, GET OFF THE BUS OR I WILL NEVER CATCH F-’

Surprising everyone, at light speed, a scrawny looking kid with soft blond hair got out of the bus while, at the same time, he tried to dry his tears as well as apologise to his battery partner in every way he knew how. Watching the scene, all three Seido catchers present felt an involuntary surge of admiration as well as compassion towards the younger catcher, and even Miyuki found himself appreciating his excellent pitcher managing skills.

‘DO NOT HIDE BEHIND ME!’ the boy shouted again, ‘AND QUIT CRYING, YOU HEAR ME?’

The pitcher nodded his head so violently that some of the Seido players feared for the integrity of the kid’s cervical vertebrae. All of them noticed how no one from the Nishiura team seemed to be at all affected by this, in fact, they all continued disembarking the bus carrying their baseball equipment as if nothing had actually happened between their battery or, worse, as if these sort of things were common occurrence and of no import whatsoever.

‘Sorry about that,’ Maria said, her smile returning to her face.

‘Er…where was I?’ Rei hesitated before too regaining her composure, ‘ah yes, this is Kataoka Tesshin-san, he’s our Head Coach. Coach, this is Momoe Maria-san.’

‘It’s very nice to meet you,’ Maria said courteously extending her hand.

‘Likewise,’ Kataoka stoically replied.

‘This is Shiga-sensei,’ Maria said pointing at the older looking man, ‘he’s our team’s advisor.’

‘Welcome to Seido,’ Kataoka said shaking Shiga-sensei’s hand.

‘Thank you,’ Shiga-sensei replied, ‘my role as advisor is very limited though,’ he felt the need to clarify, ‘I’m a newbie when it comes to baseball,’ he added and, producing a book he had been holding behind his back, he showed it to Kataoka and said, ‘but I’m learning as fast as I can.’

They all heard a gasp coming from the Seido players’ side. All eyes on him, Chris found himself staring at the cover of the book: _“Baseball for Beginners by J. Animal M.”_

‘CHRIS-SENPAI!’ Sawamura shouted all of a sudden, ‘that’s your father’s…’

‘Be quiet,’ Chris ordered him, trying not to blush much more than he already was.

Before any of the Nishiura team members could ask for an explanation, Yuuki decided to step out of his place in the front row and, walking towards the dark haired boy, he extended his hand and said:

‘I’m Yuuki Tetsuya, the team’s captain.’

The dark haired boy looked up at him for a moment before he realised the misunderstanding.

‘Sorry but I’m not the captain,’ he explained, ‘he is,’ he added indicating the boy with the buzz cut.

‘Oh,’ a flustered Yuuki said, now looking at the right person, ‘please accept my apologies.’

‘Oh it’s okay,’ the tall boy replied looking even more troubled than Yuuki, ‘it happens all the time so, I’m used to it, you know? Besides, I’ve only been doing this for less than a month and I…’ a powerful death glare courtesy of the dark haired boy stopped his captain’s verbal dump and, thanks to that, the kid managed to steady himself. He then took Yuuki’s hand in his and said, ‘I’m Hanai, it is very nice to meet you, Yuuki-san.’

‘It’s nice to meet you too, Hanai-kun,’ Yuuki said finally allowing himself a smile.

‘He’s Abe Takaya,’ Hanai explained as soon as he released Yuuki’s hand, ‘he’s our catcher as well as one of the two vice-captains.’

‘Hello,’ Abe simply said.

‘This is, as you know by now, Mihashi Ren, he’s our ace.’

At the mention of the word “ace”, Mihashi seemed to turn red with a weird mix of embarrassment as well as something which could have been called pride, if it wasn’t because it definitely looked out of place in the young pitcher’s face. Regardless of this, Yuuki tried to shake his hand too but this gesture seemed to shock the poor kid so much that it made the captain hastily retract his hand.

‘Hi,’ he settled to say instead.

Mihashi chocked in whatever response he had tried to utter and started coughing.

‘Give me strength,’ they heard Abe mumble to himself, ‘Mihashi, just say _hello_.’

‘Hello,’ the pitcher automatically said with a goofy looking smile.

Yuuki didn’t know what to do with that but, thankfully, he didn’t have to as Hanai continued introducing the rest of the team, starting by some kid called Oki Kazutoshi who played in the same position as Yuuki himself did, firstbase, but also was the team’s reserve, southpaw pitcher. This piece of news peaked Sawamura’s interest but before nothing could come out of it, they moved on to the next boy, a nice looking little guy called Sakaeguchi Yuuto, the other vice-captain who played secondbase and seemed to be the first normal boy of the bunch so far.

Hanai was about to introduce the next player, the shortest kid of them all, when Rei exclaimed:

‘Tajima Yuuichiro-kun!’

Tajima looked to be as confused as everyone else that the woman obviously knew him.

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ Rei asked Maria using an unmistakably accusing tone of voice.

‘I have no idea what you’re talking about, Rei-san,’ Maria replied.

‘I spent _months_ trying to convince him to come to Seido,’ Rei finally explained.

‘Oh, I remember now!’ Tajima had the goodness to say, ‘you’re the one who kept pestering me!’

‘Tajima-kun!’ Maria admonished him.

‘Wait a moment,’ Kataoka intervened, ‘are you telling me that this kid rejected your offer?’

‘Yes, he did,’ Rei was ashamed to admit, ‘no matter what I said, he kept telling me he had another school in mind and that he would not change his mind,’ she then glared at Maria and said, ‘I knew you had to be involved somehow…’

‘Momokan had nothing to do with that,’ Tajima interrupted her, defending his beloved coach.

‘Is he that good?’ Yuuki asked intervening in the conversation.

‘Yes,’ Rei replied, ‘he was famous in the Seniors for never failing to hit a pitch he’d seen once. I wanted to recruit him so we could train him to be your replacement once you graduate.’

An impressed murmur erupted in Seido’s side and, predictably, quite a few of the players started studying Tajima with the sort of interest one held towards a particularly dangerous enemy. On the opposite side, the Nishiura boys stared at their genius batter with various degrees of jealousy, admiration and/or pride. Oblivious to all of that attention, Tajima shrugged his tiny shoulders and asked:

‘What’s so cool about that?’

This time, even Kataoka was forced to look astonished.

‘Why did you choose Nishiura?’ Rei somehow managed to ask Tajima.

‘Cause it’s close to my house,’ the kid replied with a grin, ‘one minute by bike!’

Rei could not even bring herself to reply to that.

‘Now, that _is_ cool, isn’t it?’ Tajima asked, grinning at everyone.

Captain Hanai visibly shook his head in disbelief before concluding the team’s introductions: Suyama Shouji, the shortstop, Mizutani Fumiki, the left fielder, Izumi Kousuke, the center fielder and the only actual reserve player the team seemed to have: Nishihiro Shintaro.

Then, it was finally Seido's turn to introduce themselves.

_To be continued…_


	4. We're Seido

**We’re Seido**

Without wasting a moment, Seido’s captain began the introduction of his own team starting by a player whose towering figure culminated with a perfectly shaved head and who had a stern but at the same time kind expression in his small-ish eyes.

‘This is Tanba Koichiro,’ Yuuki said, ‘he’s our ace.’

Mihashi audibly gasped but was promptly ignored by the rest of his team.

‘He’s Miyuki Kazuya,’ Yuuki continued, ‘our main catcher.’

‘Hi there!’ the bespectacled boy said offering his friendliest smile to the Nishiura kids.

Abe wasn’t fooled by that, if the stats Shin’oka had collected reflected the truth, he knew that Miyuki was one of the most dangerous members of that team, the manipulative mastermind behind all their plays. He got confirmation of this fact when, unnoticed by anyone else, he caught the challenging way in which Miyuki was looking at him through his sports glasses.

Because of this, Abe almost missed the introduction of another three key players: the man covering second base, a pink haired guy called Kominato Ryosuke, who was surprisingly even shorter than Tajima but who had an eerily smile that sent a cold shiver down their spine.

The other one, a massive looking fellow, third year Masuko Tooru in charge of third base; Abe knew he was one of the resident homerun hitters on the team.

‘He’s Kuramochi Youichi,’ Yuuki announced indicating another of his players who was as tall as Abe but looked to be somewhat of a delinquent, ‘he’s our shortstop and fastest runner.’

‘It’s nice to meet you all,’ the boy replied sounding surprisingly polite, ‘I hope we’ll have fun!’

‘S- such a nice guy,’ Abe heard Mihashi comment to Sakaeguchi.

The next player who was introduced was Sakai Ichirou who told them he was from Saitama.

‘Awesome!’ Tajima exclaimed.

‘They’re from Saitama too,’ Yuuki said pointing at two other players, ‘he’s Kawakami Norifumi, our best sidearm pitcher and Miyauchi Keisuke, our third year catcher.’

‘Hello,’ Kawakami greeted them with a sweet but shy smile.

‘Are you all from the same town in Saitama?’ Miyauchi asked them.

‘Nope!’ Tajima replied before poor Hanai could even speak, he then grabbed Mihashi’s by his arm and pointing at him with a proud smile, he announced, ‘he’s our Foreign Fighter!’

‘Idiot,’ Izumi complained noticing Seido’s confused looks, ‘how many times do we have to tell you? Gunma is still in Japan, you know?’

‘Ah,’ Miyauchi said quickly recovering, ‘you’re from Gunma then?’

Mihashi looked around himself and pointed at his face with an inquiring look.

‘Yes, he’s asking you,’ Abe said with as much patience as he could muster.

Mihashi looked first at Abe, then back at Miyauchi and offered a quick nod, before violently blushing for some unknown reason, causing Abe to grunt at him.

‘Anyway,’ Yuuki intervened, ‘this is Isashiki Jun, he plays center field, and Shirasu Kenjirou, who plays right,’ he then carried on without giving either player the time to speak he also introduced another six members of his team before concluding, ‘last but not least, these three are the only first years in our first string: pitcher Furuya Satoru, reserve second baseman Kominato Haruichi and our southpaw pitcher Sawamura Eijun.’

‘T- t- they have f- four pitchers!’ a horrified Mihashi exclaimed all of a sudden.

‘Of course they do,’ Abe replied before anyone else could, ‘I told you before, didn’t I? Every team needs at least one relief pitcher, only an idiot like you would pitch for two consecutive games every single day!’

Hearing this startled Tanba and Kawakami, both trying to imagine the sheer amount of stamina such a feat would require while Furuya looked at Mihashi feeling immensely jealous of him. The only one who seemed to find this absolutely normal was Sawamura.

‘What’s wrong with that?’ he exclaimed while grinning at Mihashi.

‘EVERYTHING!’ the entire Seido team said at the same time.

‘Why?’ Sawamura complained after Kuramochi kicked him, ‘I did that in middle school too!’

‘I give up,’ Kuramochi surrendered.

Hearing this made Mihashi stare intently at Sawamura and, to their respective catchers’ horror, it looked like an instant bond had just formed between the two. Abe even caught Mihashi grinning back at Sawamura and the sight made him feel something he didn’t care to identify.

Fortunately, he didn’t have time to think about it for, at long last, the adults decided to take charge and, soon enough, both teams found themselves following Rei and Kataoka on a quick tour around Seido’s impressive facilities starting by the dormitory where most of the first string slept during the school year.

‘That’s my room over there,’ Sawamura pointed out, speaking to Mihashi.

It shocked Abe to see that, in between the entrance and the dormitory, the southpaw first year pitcher from Seido had managed to get so close to Mihashi without Abe noticing it.

‘That’s amazing!’ Mihashi replied, without a trace of his usual stutter.

‘I’ll tell you what,’ Sawamura said with a conspiring air, ‘if we get a break later on today, we can come back here and I’ll show you around. What do you think?’

‘Yeah,’ Mihashi smiled, ‘Sawamura-san is such a nice person!’

‘No, no, no,’ the southpaw pitcher said, ‘I am, aren’t I?’ he added looking flattered.

‘Yes,’ Mihashi confirmed, ‘Sawamura-san is a nice person!’

Abe watched as the pair walked away from him, with Sawamura’s arm draped around Mihashi’s shoulders, trying to get the other pitcher to call him Eijun. To his dismay, he was forced to hear Mihashi not only agreeing but, what was worse, asking ‘Eijun-kun’ to call him Ren too.

‘They’re a handful, aren’t they?’ Abe heard someone else say.

Turning round he found himself looking up at Miyuki’s face. Now he was this close to him, Abe realised that Seido’s main catcher was nearly ten centimeters taller than him. This made him feel slightly uncomfortable but, squaring his shoulders, he tried to appear a little taller.

‘It looks like you have it especially bad,’ Miyuki continued, his tone of voice revealing nothing.

‘I wouldn’t say that,’ Abe finally spoke.

‘No?’ Miyuki asked him with the tinniest hint of curiosity.

‘No,’ Abe insisted, ‘Mihashi is fine the way he is.’

‘Oh,’ Miyuki said then, he laughed a little and said, ‘is that so?’

‘Yes,’ Abe replied, ‘Miyuki-san, on the other hand, you have four pitchers to manage.’

‘Aren’t I a lucky one?’ the older catcher asked flippantly.

‘What do you mean?’ Abe asked.

‘Well,’ Miyuki replied, ‘think of all the fun I get to have, pitchers, after all, are a lot of _fun_.’

‘Not always,’ Abe disagreed, ‘at least not in my experience.’

‘That’s interesting,’ Miyuki said narrowing his eyes a little, ‘care to share?’

‘I wouldn’t want to bore you with the details,’ Abe replied evasively.

Miyuki studied him for a little and then he said:

‘Maybe another time.’

‘Yeah,’ Abe said.

‘Well,’ Miyuki said concluding their first conversation, ‘I’ll see you at the bullpen.’

‘Of course,’ Abe said.

At long last, they made it to the A Ground which had been reserved for the entire day while the rest of the team trained in their secondary field. Needless to say, the Nishiura boys were deeply awed that Seido had two separate grounds to play baseball and it caused Rei a high degree of pleasure to see Tajima rushing from one place to the other inspecting all the expensive equipment Seido owned, looking suitably impressed.

‘Now you wish you’d come to Seido, huh?’ she muttered so quietly only Kataoka heard her.

The coach allowed himself the tiniest smile before, speaking to the gathered crowd, he said:

‘We’ll now start a light warm up, make sure you all stretch properly for today’s training.’

‘Yes, sir!’ the Seido team shouted all at once.

‘Momoe-san,’ Kataoka then said to Nishiura’s coach.

‘Boys, let’s get started,’ she simply said.

Just as the Seido members readied themselves to start running, they all watched with equal parts of curiosity and confusion while the ten members of the Nishiura team, along with their manager and advisor, all sat down on the ground, forming a small circle.

‘What’s…’ Rei started.

‘It’s becoming our tradition,’ Maria explained to her and Kataoka, ‘we always start our mornings with a bit of meditation. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to join in their circle.’

With that, she too sat down, placing herself in between Izumi and Hanai, taking their hands in hers. Then, as if this didn’t astonish them enough, they all heard Shiga-sensei's clear voice say:

‘Okay, you can now all feel your partner’s hands. They might be cold, or they might be warm. Register that temperature in your mind and start breathing; now, with me: breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out; slowly, without rush, breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out. Feel your body temperature as it rises and then, share that warmth with your partner, make sure their hand is as warm as yours.’

Kataoka continued to watch the scene unfolding in front of him for a couple of minutes. He saw that the Nishiura players all breathed at the same time; their bodies and minds uniting in a way that almost transcended what was normal between team-mates.

It was only then when he realised what this whole thing was about: forget meditation, this was the best team building exercise he’d ever seen. Lifting his eyes towards Chris and Miyuki, he saw that the two best strategists in his team had also reached the same conclusion: Nishiura was not a team they could underestimate.

‘It seems,’ Kataoka spoke to Rei as quietly as he could, ‘that today will be a very interesting day.’

_To be continued…_


	5. Bullpen Practice

**Bullpen Practice**

Breakfast in the Seido canteen consisted of grilled mackerel, steamed vegetables and copious amounts of pristine boiled rice. Kuramochi, in keeping with the best of his school’s tradition, was about to make sure their guests ate at least three bowls of rice when, to his amazement, he saw that all ten of the Nishiura boys had no qualms with eating three bowls or more of rice, but also, their star batter Tajima asked if he and Mihashi could have seconds of their main meal.

‘Are you sure you want to eat so much?’ the shortstop asked Mihashi who was busy gulping down his fourth bowl of rice, ‘we have a game today, you know?’

The first year pitcher looked at him as if he didn’t understand a word.

‘Nah,’ Tajima answered instead, ‘this is what we normally eat. We’re all growing up here!’

‘I’ll have another one too!’ Sawamura exclaimed all of a sudden.

‘Eijun-kun…’ Haruichi admonished him, ‘stop getting provoked by the opponents!’

‘But…’

‘Mihashi,’ Sakaeguchi said, setting down his chopsticks, ‘let’s call it quits with the food, okay?’

‘B-but,’ the pitcher stuttered, ‘I…’

‘We can eat more later,’ Sakaeguchi explained, ‘besides, Kuramochi-san is right, we still have work to do and it won’t do to overeat, no matter how good the food is.’

Pouting a little, Mihashi decided to finish what he had left of his mackerel and finish his rice.

‘There,’ Haruichi told Sawamura, ‘he’s stopped now, you can stop too.’

‘Oookay,’ Sawamura said wearing a matching pout.

From his place on the table, Sakaeguchi exchanged an accomplice smile with Haruichi who, for once, did not blush. Instead he returned the gesture, happy that he’d found in the Nishiura team, someone who seemed to cover, not only his same playing position but also, his pitcher babysitting role.

For this reason, Haruichi was happy to hear that the first part of their combined training would separate the pitcher-catcher batteries, who would head for the bullpen, from the rest of the team, who would head to the grounds for batting and fielding practice. Haruichi hoped that there would be an opportunity to talk to Sakaeguchi there.

While all the players walked to their destinations, Abe started studying the four Seido pitchers and the way they interacted with the catchers. He already knew he had to be careful with Miyuki, but he also felt that third year Takigawa Chris Yuu was equally as dangerous if not more. Thankfully, it seemed that the senior was not actively playing, Abe did not know why.

At the bullpen, they were joined by a fourth catcher, a second year called Ohno, who didn’t seem to be much of a danger but that seemed to get on well with everyone. Unlike Miyuki, Abe thought, as he noticed Tanba making an extra effort to avoid him.

‘A-abe…Abe-kun,’ Mihashi said fidgeting as ever.

‘Have you finished your stretching exercises?’ Abe asked him.

‘N-no…b-but…’

‘Finish them, take care of warming up your shoulder properly,’ Abe ordered him.

Mihashi looked at him for a fraction of a second before throwing a quick glance at the rest of the pitchers: Tanba was already throwing pitches at Miyauchi, Kawakami had also started training with Ohno and even Sawamura and Furuya seemed eager to start their work.

‘Chris-senpai!’ Sawamura exclaimed eagerly, ‘will you catch for me?’

‘Sorry but I’m going to be observing today,’ Chris replied crushing his kohai’s hopes.

‘Sawamura,’ Miyuki suggested in a rare moment of goodness, ‘let’s have you throw first, meanwhile Furuya can train with the net…’

‘Miyuki-san,’ Abe intervened, ‘Mihashi is still warming up, while I wait for him to finish, I can catch for Furuya.’

‘Er…’ Miyuki said hesitantly, ‘that’d be…well…’

‘You said it yourself while we were coming here,’ Abe pointed out, ‘this is a friendly match, no need to keep secrets from the other, is there?’

Once again, Miyuki found himself in awe at how very dangerously sharp the younger catcher could be. He felt grateful this was, indeed, a friendly meeting, otherwise…

‘Abe,’ Chris said interrupting Miyuki’s train of thought, ‘we’re grateful for the offer but, unfortunately, catching Furuya’s pitches is dangerous and you might get hurt.’

‘I doubt it,’ Abe replied with unwavering conviction.

‘Abe, listen,’ Miyuki started, then he seemed to change his mind and said, ‘okay, let’s do this: Furuya, throw just one pitch at him, Abe will then see for himself.’

‘Are you sure?’ Furuya asked his catcher.

‘Yeah,’ Miyuki said then, grinning at Abe, he added, ‘don’t tell us we didn’t warn you.’

Abe didn’t say anything to that, instead, he busied himself strapping his gear on with Mihashi’s help. A few minutes later, he squatted down in place, ready to receive Furuya’s pitches.

‘Do your best,’ he taunted the pitcher.

Everyone at the bullpen stopped doing whatever they were doing as they all watched Furuya raising his arms in the standard wind-up, he then lifted his leg up and with the usual, clinical way that characterised his pitches, he threw the ball at Abe the hardest he could.

Miyuki was ready to start mocking Abe when, to his and everyone else’s astonishment, the first year catcher stopped the ball in his mitt with the practiced ease of someone who was used to it.

‘Not bad,’ Abe said getting up, already throwing the ball at Furuya, ‘again!’

The first year monster rookie looked at the ball in his hands before glancing at the unknown catcher who, not only had managed to catch the ball, but who was actually asking for more.

Doubtful about what to do, he glanced at Miyuki who gave him just a curt nod.

Furuya repeated the throw, this time trying to imprint even more speed. To no avail, it seemed that no matter how fast, Abe was still able to catch for him. Furuya’s initial surprise turned into badly contained joy: in that very bullpen, other than Miyuki and Miyauchi, there was a third catcher who could catch his pitches. Three! In the same place!

‘You look too happy!’ Sawamura complained from the sidelines.

Furuya ignored him, and instead, continued throwing at Abe who, after fifteen pitches, decided to call it a day. The pitcher felt washed with disappointment and was about to protest when Miyuki stopped catching for Sawamura and hurried to Abe’s side.

‘Are you okay? Did you get hurt?’

‘No,’ Abe replied removing his mitt, showing that his hand was a little red but nothing out of the ordinary, ‘there’s no point continuing. You were right: he should practice with the net first.’

‘Why?’ Miyuki asked him keeping his tone carefully neutral.

‘Are you sure I can be honest?’ Abe asked him instead.

‘Please,’ Miyuki insisted.

‘Okay then,’ Abe said looking at Furuya, ‘I’ll tell you the same thing I told my previous pitcher, he was a lot like you: all power, little to no control. You need to fix that as soon as you can.’

‘I know,’ Furuya reluctantly replied.

That, for some reason, impressed Abe who mellowed a little and said:

‘Then, all is good.’

‘I have an idea,’ Miyuki announced, ‘do you think I could catch for Mihashi?’

Abe’s relaxed expression quickly changed into one of extreme concern. He was about to decline the offer when he allowed himself to think about it for a moment: Miyuki was a nation class catcher, and judging by the pitchers he was in charge of, he was probably used to all sorts of pitching styles, which meant that he would quickly notice the greatness that was Mihashi.

‘Is that a no?’ Miyuki insisted again, clearly challenging Abe.

‘On the contrary,’ Abe replied, ‘providing Mihashi has nothing against it…’

Mihashi threw a nervous look at his battery partner, unable to determine what Abe was thinking. He then allowed himself a quick glance at Miyuki, finding he was grinning at him.

‘What do you say?’ the catcher asked him.

‘Er…’ Mihashi hesitated, ‘A-a…Abe-k…Abe-kun…’

‘It’s okay,’ Abe said placing his hand on Mihashi’s shoulder, ‘it’s okay,’ he repeated.

Mihashi stared at his catcher for a moment before he lowered his head, then, without looking at anyone else, he went to grab his glove and walked to the side reserved for the pitchers.

‘P-please…do…don’t b-be d-disappointed…’ he managed to utter while he got ready.

‘Don’t worry, just throw your best pitch,’ Miyuki shouted as he lowered himself in position.

Once again, everyone observed as Mihashi simply gathered a little momentum and, without any wind up, he just raised his leg a little and threw the ball perfectly in the middle of the mitt.

‘So slow…’ Miyauchi said obviously thinking out loud.

‘Once again,’ Miyuki asked Mihashi who was blushing a violent shade of red.

‘B-but…’

‘It’s fine,’ Miyuki said, ‘let’s do this: try to pitch them where you see the mitt, okay?’

Hearing this, Abe narrowed his eyes. He also caught Chris observing the scene and what he saw in the older catcher’s eyes was something resembling a surprised awe. This told Abe that both Miyuki as well as Chris had already figured out what was so special about Mihashi.

Exactly nine balls later, Miyuki stood up and started laughing out loud. Once he stopped, he glanced at Abe and, still grinning, he said:

‘I understand now.’

‘Indeed,’ Chris agreed, he stepped closer to Mihashi and asked him, ‘what do you throw?’

Mihashi glanced up at the much older boy but, before he could try to answer, Abe replied:

‘He’s got four breaking balls, plus the raising fastball you’ve already seen.’

‘ARE YOU KIDDING ME?’ Sawamura shouted startling the poor Mihashi.

‘That’s not all,’ Miyuki said, ‘I moved the mitt covering nine different strike positions, he managed to hit the target 100% of the time. His control is better than yours, Nori.’

‘Wow,’ Sawamura gasped, ‘what is he? A control monster?’

‘Something like that,’ Chris replied.

Abe looked at Mihashi and was pleased with what he saw: the kid was blushing as bright as a light house but, he had never seen him looking happier and as confident as Mihashi could be.

His mission was complete.

_To be continued…_


	6. Simple Perfection

**Simple Perfection**

With all the batteries busy in the bullpen, Kataoka and Maria took the remaining members of the Seido and Nishiura teams to Ground A where they were split in two different groups. The first, smaller one, formed by Yuuki, Isashiki and Haruichi from Seido, and Hanai, Tajima and Izumi from Nishiura were currently practicing their batting, aided by six brand new pitching machines owned by the prestigious school.

‘They're so lucky,’ Hanai muttered to himself while getting ready for another fastball.

Truth was, the Nishiura captain was very impressed with the seemingly endless amount of high tech material the Seido players used for their training, especially when compared with the relatively meagre supplies the Nishiura had at their disposal. With a pang, he remembered how very hard their coach worked in order to provide for a lot of said material, and started feeling so guilty that he almost missed the next pitch.

Thankfully for his ego, he didn’t.

In fact, Hanai was actually swinging quite well and, other than a few balls here and there, and some hits that had been rather poor, he was hitting the ball quite far, at least according to his standards.

He had just finished this thought when, coming from somewhere to his right side, he heard a very weird, rhythmic sound. At first he failed to identify it but then, his brain realised what it was.

‘What the…’

The captain stopped paying attention to his own pitching machine, only taking the precaution to step out of its way, focusing it on Tajima and Yuuki instead. He quickly understood what the two batting geniuses were doing: one after another, they were hitting each pitch in perfect sync.

It was almost musical, the sound their bats made at each contact with the ball, and quite depressing, to witness the ease with which they both accomplished such a feat.

‘Amazing, aren’t they?’ he heard someone ask. It was the bearded third year called Isashiki, if Hanai remembered correctly, ‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen our captain looking so happy.’

Hanai looked at Yuuki who, indeed seemed to be having the time of his life. Again, the same thing could be said of Tajima. His face was lit up with the sheer joy of doing what he liked the most: swinging the bat the quickest and most efficient way possible to send the ball darting into the air.

‘Yeah…’ he found himself saying, ‘I’ll never get to their level.’

‘You don’t have to,’ Isashiki told him sounding very serious.

‘But…’

‘I know,’ the older boy said, ‘trust me, I know,’ he repeated for emphasis, ‘I’ve been competing with that monster for long enough and, at first I too felt that I had to keep up no matter what. But then I realised that even if I can’t get to his level, I still can help the team.’

‘How?’ Hanai dared to ask.

‘Do your best,’ Isashiki simply said, ‘do things your way and you’ll surely contribute to the team.’

The older player grinned and, grabbing Hanai’s bat, he positioned himself in front of the pitching machine Hanai had been using until then. The third year waited for a ball to be pitched and then, without using an orthodox batting stance, he used the bat almost as if it were a club, hitting the ball with so much violence that it just flew, quite literally, out of the park.

‘See?’ Isashiki said.

Hanai felt his lips curve up in a smile and, before the Seido player could leave, he bowed and said:

‘Thank you very much, Isashiki-san, I will do my best!’

‘Such a polite kid,’ Isashiki said blushing a little, ‘pity you’re so tall, otherwise we could be friends!’

‘Isashiki-san…’

‘Seriously, between you and Furuya…what the hell do you kids eat these days?’

He left without waiting for Hanai to reply, instead, he returned to his spot to continue practicing his batting, wordlessly suggesting Hanai to do the same. With newfound motivation, the Nishiura captain waited for a ball, swinging with all his might. He missed, but he didn’t let that get him down.

‘Again!’ he encouraged himself.

Meanwhile, a different set of monsters were at work: Kataoka and Maria were currently supplying grounders for some infielders. At the moment, they had both of Seido’s and Nishiura’s shortstop and second baseman combinations on the field, taking it in turns to practice their plays.

Allowing himself a very short break from his batting practice, Haruichi stopped just long enough to watch his older brother Ryosuke and his trusty partner, shortstop Kuramochi, as the latter caught a ball that was zipping past the middle of the infield, quickly throwing it straight into Ryosuke’s glove. As always, Haruichi felt almost jealous at the practiced perfection shown by the pair.

Returning to his batting practice, Haruichi hit yet another tight curveball and by the time he sent a few balls exactly where he wanted them to go, he noticed that Sakaeguchi and Suyama had now replaced the Seido players and their coach, someone Haruichi found as fearsome as Kataoka himself, started hitting quite a few mean looking balls their way. To his surprise, he saw that the two boys were just as efficient as the Seido pair, if not more.

‘Nice catch!’ he heard a smiling Sakaeguchi shouting at his partner.

Suyama, probably being a little more subdued, just gave him a thumb up sign.

A short while after this, both Kataoka and Momokan gathered all their players, mixing up both of their teams, to practice base running and, whether it was by coincidence or design, Haruichi didn’t really care, he found himself standing right next to Sakaeguchi. He stole a couple of nervous glances at him, considering the best way to start a conversation, when to his utmost relief, he heard the Nishiura second baseman talking to him.

‘This is so much fun, isn’t it?’

‘Yes, it is,’ Haruichi agreed still fighting his natural shyness.

‘It’s nice being able to take it easy once in a while,’ Sakaeguchi said.

‘Yes, it is,’ Haruichi repeated then, realising he had said the same thing twice, he blushed a little.

Sakaeguchi simply smiled at him and, acting as if nothing had happened, he commented:

‘I’m so jealous, you know? Having all these great senpai around you, you must be learning a lot.’

‘I am,’ Haruichi finally said, ‘they’re truly amazing, I can only hope I’ll be able to keep up.’

‘Isn’t that a good incentive?’ Sakaeguchi asked grinning at him.

‘It’s the best motivation I can get,’ Haruichi agreed returning the smile.

They didn’t have much more time to talk as Sakaeguchi got Momokan’s sign to start his lap around the bases. The boy was surprisingly fast, Haruichi noticed, not quite as fast as Kuramochi but, for someone still in his first year, it was impressive enough for even Seido’s high standards.

‘I can’t be left behind!’ Haruichi thought out loud while he too started running towards first base.

Half an hour later, while the outfielders practiced catching flyballs, Haruichi saw that Sakaeguchi was trying to settle Tajima down. Drawn by curiosity, he decided to join the two players and asked:

‘Is there any problem?’

‘Sorry,’ Sakaeguchi started by apologising, ‘but Tajima here needs to go to the bathroom but we can’t remember where it is.’

‘Oh, I see,’ Haruichi said understanding the predicament, ‘I can show you the way, if you wish.’

‘That’s so nice of you!’ Sakaeguchi exclaimed.

‘COME ON, IT’S GOING TO EXPLODE!’ Tajima shouted.

Hurrying up, before the batting genius could get any more unwanted attention, Haruichi led the way to the bathrooms installed in between Ground A and the area reserved to the bullpen. They had almost reached them when they noticed Sawamura running towards them.

‘Hey!’ the pitcher shouted.

‘Eijun-kun,’ Haruichi said, ‘aren’t you supposed to be pitching now?’

‘Yeah,’ he replied, ‘but Ren left a while ago to go to the bathroom and he hasn’t come back yet.’

‘Where is Abe?’ Sakaeguchi asked him.

Only then Sawamura seemed to notice the absence and said:

‘I thought he was right behind me!’

‘Eijun-kun!’ Haruichi complained.

‘Anyway,’ Sakaeguchi started, ‘we…’

His sentence got interrupted when he saw an impatient Tajima darting towards the bathroom. Sakaeguchi , together with the two Seido players, decided to follow him, only to crash against his back. Something had forced Tajima to stop right at the bathroom’s entrance, Sakaeguchi barely had time to register that when he heard his team mate's angry shout:

‘WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!’.

He was about to ask what was going on when, taking a peek over Tajima’s shoulder he was met with a most unsettling scene: there, for some unknown reason, they saw Furuya towering over poor Mihashi, who was trapped in between the much taller pitcher and the bathroom’s wall, while covering his face with his hands shivering like a chick left outside in the rain.

_To be continued…_

 


	7. Play Ball

**Play Ball**

Forgetting all about his impending physiological needs, Tajima marched into the bathroom ready to snatch Furuya away from Mihashi, too angry to even consider the fact that the pitcher was nearly twenty centimeters taller than him. It was only thanks to the combined efforts from Sakaeguchi together with Sawamura and Haruichi that they managed to stop him.

‘Furuya-kun...’ Haruichi started.

‘Get away from Mihashi, NOW!’ Tajima nearly barked.

‘Okay,’ Sawamura interceded, ‘let’s all calm down,’ he added, surprising everyone so much, especially his own team mates, that it made Furuya finally step out from Mihashi’s personal space, ‘what were you doing to Ren?’ the southpaw asked, indeed sounding weirdly poised.

Frustratingly enough, Furuya refused to reply.

‘Mihashi,’ Sakaeguchi said, using a most soothing tone of voice, ‘are you okay?’

Needless to say, the poor kid was still too startled to even try to speak.

With the situation having reached an obvious impasse, Haruichi decided to take charge by nudging Furuya as far away from the Nishiura players as it was possible in the confined space. He was about to suggest they’d leave them alone to speak to their pitcher when, to his horror, he saw Mihashi’s battery partner arrive, closely followed by none other than Miyuki.

‘What’s going on?’ the second year asked them.

‘Mihashi!’ Abe shouted seeing his pitcher looking distressed, ‘are you hurt? What happened?’

‘We’re trying to figure it out,’ Sakaeguchi helpfully explained.

‘But neither of them are talking,’ Sawamura added indicating both Furuya and Mihashi.

‘I see,’ Miyuki said.

Abe, in the meantime was making sure his pitcher wasn’t hurt in any way or form by personally checking his body, focusing his attention on his wrists, especially his right one. Miyuki found it a tad on the exaggerated side but set that thought aside, concentrating on Furuya instead.

‘What happened between you and Mihashi?’ he asked his pitcher.

Surprisingly, the first year just looked down, employing his best evading skills.

‘Mihashi,’ Sakaeguchi tried again, ‘he wasn’t bullying you, was he?’

Finally, a much calmer Tajima decided to intervene:

‘We won’t let anyone hurt you, you know that, right?’

At long last, Mihashi seemed to acknowledge this with a tiny nod, this encouraged Tajima to continue, while made everyone else pay attention to the proceedings. The genius batter offered Mihashi his best smile and that got the pitcher to start communicating, albeit in his own way.

The Seido players watched as the Nishiura ace explained himself with a short series of seemingly incomprehensible gestures that, weirdly enough, looked like Tajima could perfectly understand.

‘Ah, I see,’ the boy said, ‘so that’s what happened!’

‘Care to share with the class?’ Abe asked him with so much snark even Miyuki was impressed.

‘Easy,’ Tajima replied nevertheless, ‘Mihashi went into the bathroom and when he got out, he found Furuya there. Furuya asked him if he could teach him something but Mihashi didn’t know how. Mihashi thinks Furuya misunderstood him and then we came in and found them here.’

‘Did he really say all of that?’ a wide-eyed Sawamura asked.

‘Of course,’ Tajima replied, ‘the question is, what did he want you to teach him?’

Mihashi stole a very nervous glance at Furuya who was still stubbornly glaring at the floor.

‘Let me guess,’ Miyuki said before Mihashi could try to explain himself, the catcher looked at Furuya and, with a disapproving look on his face, he asked him: ‘you thought you could learn pitch control from him, didn’t you?’

Furuya’s only response was a slight twitch of his head.

‘Mihashi, come here,’ they all heard Abe say.

Before anyone could do anything to stop him, he took Mihashi’s hand and, literally dragging him to where Furuya was, ignoring the whimpering coming from him, he then grabbed Furuya’s own hand and, to everyone’s utmost shock, he placed it on top of Mihashi’s palm.

‘Feel that,’ he ordered Furuya.

The Seido pitcher looked at Abe for a moment and, not really knowing what to do he dared to look at Miyuki who silently told him to comply with the other catcher’s order. Slowly, he started touching Mihashi’s fingers with his own finding very soon what Abe wanted him to see.

‘Oh,’ Furuya gasped.

‘Those are calluses,’ Abe almost needlessly explained, ‘Mihashi has been practicing for so long, in order to locate the pitches where he wanted them that he has a callus for every pitch type he taught himself. This sort of thing isn’t something you can have someone teach you overnight.’

‘Exactly,’ Miyuki agreed, ‘we can probably teach you some techniques but, the rest, it’s up to practice. The only way you can get as good as Mihashi is by training for as long as he has.’

‘I see!’ Sawamura exclaimed.

‘No,’ Miyuki countered, ‘not you, this doesn’t apply to you, you already work TOO much.’

‘And you too,’ Abe told Mihashi before his pitcher would get any funny ideas.

‘Is all understood?’ Miyuki asked, probably asking all three of the pitchers present.

‘Yes,’ Sawamura answered for all of them.

‘Okay,’ the second year catcher said, glad they had somehow managed to deal with the situation, ‘then we should all head to the canteen or we’ll be late for lunch.’

‘OH CRAP!’ they then heard Tajima exclaim, ‘I FORGOT I NEEDED TO PEE!’

‘Then go!’ Sakaeguchi said looking slightly embarrassed, ‘stop telling everyone and go!’

After Tajima took care of his private business, Miyuki led the way for the bunch of first years, feeling a tad like an unlucky kindergarten teacher who’d been left in charge of the difficult kids.

When they arrived at the canteen, they found that several groups had been formed in between the two teams. To Haruichi’s disappointment, Sakaeguchi rushed to join Suyama who was sitting with Kuramochi and Ryosuke. The Nishiura shortstop looking very pleased to see his partner.

In another table, they saw Sakai, Kawakami and Miyauchi, a.k.a. the Saitama homeboys from Seido who seemed to be enthralled by Mizutani’s retelling of the latest matsuri festival celebrated in Saitama City. Apparently, one of Kawakami’s favourite piano players had held a surprise concert and this fact made him feel rather depressed.

‘It’s okay, Kawakami-san,’ Izumi reassured him, ‘I think you can find some fancams on YouTube.’

This made the sidearm pitcher smile in a rather adorable way.

On another table, Miyuki saw the Seido’s captain seated next to Nishiura’s first baseman Oki. The older boy was currently engaged in some sort of pep talk, trying to convince Oki that even if other people didn’t think so, playing first baseman was the coolest position of them all.

‘Er…’ Oki tried to say he wasn’t really that bothered but Yuuki cut him off again.

‘No, no,’ the mighty captain insisted, ‘don’t let anyone put you down, first base is the BEST.’

Wisely enough, the Nishiura player just decided to go along with the flow and nod.

But the one taking the cake in terms of strange conversations was the one held by the adults at their table. In fact, as Miyuki and the first year bunch sat down to start eating their lighter-than-usual lunch, they immediately heard Maria’s voice raising over everyone else’s:

‘No, no, no, it’s you, Kataoka-san who is very lucky! To think you have such a fine team, of course, mine is not bad at all, but oh, what I could do with someone like Kuramochi-kun…’

‘Suyama is not bad either, Momoe-san,’ was Kataoka’s surprising response.

‘No, he isn’t,’ Maria quickly agreed. Her smile made Miyuki realize that she was baiting Kataoka into saying exactly what she wanted her players to hear. That woman was very scary indeed.

‘It’s a pity though,’ Rei intervened all of a sudden.

‘What is?’ Maria asked her sounding overly sweet.

‘You know,’ Rei replied matching Maria’s tone, ‘if it wasn’t for the regulations that mandate that if a player transfers mid-year to another school, he’s banned to play for the baseball team for an entire twelve months…’

The pause was perfectly studied to entice the sort of reaction Maria had:

‘I see what you’re doing there. Luckily for us, the rule is very much there.’

‘Indeed,’ Rei said, ‘imagine if…’

‘Let’s not imagine anything, Rei-san,’ Maria said, ‘it’s pointless wishing for stuff you can’t get.’

‘Dreaming is free of charge,’ Rei reminded her.

‘Yeah, dreaming is,’ Maria agreed.

Fearing a cat fight, Kataoka decided he’d had enough of his meal and, getting up, he addressed his team, summoning them all to the dugout. He then looked at his assistant and said:

‘We should probably go and…prepare for the match.’

‘Of course,’ Rei said, ‘I’ll see you there,’ she added issuing a clear challenge to Maria.

‘You will,’ the Nishiura coach replied.

With this exchange, it became quickly obvious to everyone that the fun was over and it was time to get serious. Immediately, the previously cordial atmosphere which had reigned throughout the day was replaced by the sort of tense mood that preceded the start of every important match.

It was time to play ball.

_To be continued…_


End file.
